Apostles of Disunion

This paper analyzes the rhetoric of appointed state-commissioners from the Southern States advocating for secession prior to the American Civil War. The rhetoric used is very similar across all state-appointed commissioners as much of it was based on racial claims in which their biases, racism, and fear energized their claims for the need for secession. This paper explores the topic of succession exclusively through a Southern lens as the justification of succession is based on the Southern belief that all state's rights had been violated without giving slavery being the cause any validation

Propaganda on the American Home Front : The Driving Force of Mobilization

This paper explores the impact of propaganda filled mediums and their relationship to the mobilization of predominantly women and children on the American home front during World War II. Primary sources such as posters, pamphlets, films, and booklets were used as evidence to demonstrate how propaganda consumed many aspects of American life to support the war effort. This paper also explores the effectiveness of these propaganda filled mediums while also acknowledging that other factors such as economic-based were also of great importance in the mobilization of many people.&nbsp

Pricing, subsidies, and the poor : demand for improved water services in Central America

Reformulating tariff and subsidy policies is central to improving water and sanitation services in developing countries. The traditional model of state enterprise service provision, coupled with residential tariffs set well below the cost of service, has generally delivered unsatisfactory results. Low internal generation of funds has impeded expansion of networks into poor communities and has resulted in very poor services there. Most of the subsidy has benefited higher-income groups. Reformers have proposed private provision to improve efficiency, cost-reflective tariffs to permit the systems to meet demand, and better-targeted subsidies. But is there empirical evidence that existing subsidies are ineffective and that the poor could pay the full cost of water services? Analyzing household survey and water company data from cities of Central America and Venezuela, the authors confirm that: 1) Households without piped connections pay a lot for small amounts of water from"coping sources."2) Most public water companies undercharge hugely, providing an implicit, generalized subsidy and accelerating their systems'decapitalization. 3) There is little income-related differentiation in consumption and therefore in effective piped water tariffs. Volume-based tariffs would generate cross-subsidies from the rich to the poor if the rich consumed more water. But the data indicate that consumption of piped water varies little with income, so most of the water subsidy is captured by the nonpoor. 4) Poor households that are not presently connected would clearly benefit from access to piped water supply. This would require increasing tariffs to cost-reflective levels. But where the urban poor already enjoy access, such tariffincreases would have a disproportionate impact on this income group. This impact should be mitigated through better-targeted, temporary subsidies. 5) The poor are often willing to pay much more than the present tariff for access to piped water but not necessarily the full cost of the monthly consumption assumed by planners (30 cubic meters). If tariffs were set to cover long-run financial costs, many poor households would consume much less. Improving the design of tariff structures and extending metering to such households would permit them to regulate their expenditures on water by controlling their consumption.Town Water Supply and Sanitation,Water and Industry,Environmental Economics&Policies,Water Supply and Sanitation Governance and Institutions,Water Use

Variasjon i tidlige livsfaser hos Atlantisk laks : sammenheng mellom oppsvømmingstidspunkt og stressmestringsstrategier

Captive fish are exposed to a variety of stressful situations, which can affect growth rates and promote diseases. Identification and selection for stress resistant fish at early stages of the production cycle could be used as a cost-efficient tool to increase productivity, welfare and to reduce disease susceptibility in aquaculture. In different animal groups, two distinctive sets of behavioural and physiological responses to stress, termed proactive and reactive stress coping styles, have been identified. In salmonid fish, emergence time, i.e. the moment when a larva leaves the spawning red and starts exogenous feeding, has been shown to be related to growth rates, standard metabolic rates, time of smoltification and social status. In this thesis, I have studied whether variability in emergence time could be coupled to differences in stress coping styles. As well, I have investigated the relationships between other early life traits and emergence time in Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar). In the first part of the thesis, the relationship between hatching time and larval growth were examined. As well, a novel method to sort salmonid larvae according to emergence time was developed to investigate the relationships between family variation in emergence time and egg size, hatching time and larval developmental rate in Atlantic salmon. In the second part of the thesis, fry with different emergence times were screened for divergences in stress coping styles. The results in the first part of this thesis demonstrate that larvae with a late hatching time had higher post-hatch growth rates, thereby compensating for a delayed hatching time. Furthermore, comparisons between families showed a relationship between variation in egg size and hatching time, although these traits were not related to emergence time. In addition, families with a faster larval developmental rate reached emergence earlier. In the second part of this thesis, where the relationship between time to emerge and stress coping styles was investigated, it was shown that fry with an early time to emerge were bolder compared with a late emerging fry. However, differences in emergence time were not associated to other behavioural and physiological traits of the proactive and reactive coping styles, such as standard metabolic rates, social dominance, or post stress cortisol levels. The decoupling between boldness and such traits could be related to the absence of a strong selection pressure at emergence in captive fish. To conclude, this thesis demonstrates that the rate of development of the larvae, rather than egg size or hatching time, predicts time to emerge from the spawning redds in Atlantic salmon. Furthermore, this thesis presents a novel method to sort salmonid larvae that could improve rearing conditions of domesticated salmon. As well, it was shown that an earlier emergence was related to boldness behaviour, but earlier emergence was not related to other traits of the stress coping styles in domesticated Atlantic salmon. Future studies should examine if selection of fish according to emergence time is related to other production traits, such as disease resistance, growth rates, filet colour, occurrence of deformities or feed conversion ratio.Fisk i oppdrett vil være eksponert for en rekke unaturlige miljøforhold som vil innebære stress hvilket vil kunne medføre redusert tilvekst og økt forekomst av sykdom. Hensiktsmessig identifisering og seleksjon for økt stresstoleranse, anvendt tidlig i produksjonssyklusen, vil derfor kunne være et kostnadseffektivt verktøy for bedre sykdomsresistens, økt dyrevelferd og kostnadseffektiv produksjon. Det har i forsøk med ulike dyrearter blitt vist at det grovt sett finnes to ulike mønstre for fysiologiske og adferdsmessige reaksjoner på stress: proaktiv og reaktiv stressmestringstype. Det er blitt vist at det hos laks er en sammenheng mellom oppsvømmingstidspunkt, dvs. tidspunktet når en fiskelarve beveger seg bort fra gytemediet for å finne ekstern næring, og tilvekst, metabolsk rate og sosial status. I denne avhandlingen har jeg studert om variasjon i oppsvømmingstidspunkt kan kobles til forskjeller i stressmestringsstil. I tillegg har jeg undersøkt forholdet mellom andre tidlige livsegenskaper og oppsvømmingstidspunkt hos atlantisk laks (Salmo salar). I den første delen av denne studien ble forholdet mellom klekketidspunkt og larvevekst undersøkt. I tillegg ble en ny metode for å sortere yngel mht oppsvømmingstidspunkt utviklet for å undersøke sammenhengen mellom eggstørrelse, klekketidspunkt og oppsvømmingstidspunkt hos atlantisk laks. I den andre delen av studien ble det undersøkt om yngel med ulikt oppsvømmingstidspunkt domineres av ulike stressmestringstyper. Resultatene i den første delen av denne studien viser at fiskelarver med sent klekketidspunkt har høyere tilvekst i den første fasen etter klekking, noe som vil kompensere for det sene klekketidspunktet. I familiematerialet ble det dessuten vist en sammenheng mellom eggstørrelse og klekketidspunkt. Det var imidlertid ikke noe signifikant sammenheng mellom klekketidspunkt og oppsvømmingstidspunkt i dette materialet, men familier med høyest metabolsk omsetning hadde også tidligst oppsvømmingstidspunkt. I den andre delen av studien, hvor vi undersøkte om oppsvømmingstidspunkt er knyttet til adferd eller fysiologiske egenskaper som er typiske for de to stressmestringstypene, fant vi at yngel som hadde et tidlig oppsvømmingstidspunkt var modigere eller mest uredde. Men vi fant ikke at disse uredde individene også hadde de typiske trekkene til den proaktive stressmestringstypen, som er høyere metabolsk rate, sosial dominans eller lavere kortisolnivå etter standardisert stress. En mulig forklaring på dette kan skyldes fraværet av seleksjon eller stress i oppdrettsmiljøet. Etter dette må det konkluderes med at metabolsk omsetning, i langt større grad enn eggstørrelse eller klekketidspunkt, påvirker oppsvømmingstidspunkt hos atlantisk laks i oppdrett. Vi har også utviklet en ny metode for sortering av lakseyngel og denne vil kunne brukes til å bedre produksjonsforholdene til oppdrettsfisk. I tillegg ble det vist at tidlig oppsvømmingstidspunkt var relatert til modig oppførsel, selv om tidlig oppsvømmingstidspunkt ikke ble relatert til andre trekk ved stressmestringstypene i opdrettslaks. Ytterligere studier bør undersøke om disse metodene i et seleksjonsprogram også vil kunne gi bedret sykdomsresistens, tilvekst, fôrutnyttelse og kvalitetsegenskaper.Norges Forskningsrå